Pipelines, such as storm water drain pipes, sewer pipes, oil pipes, and other kinds of pipes, occasionally crack, break, or have other local faults requiring repair. In the past, point repair of such pipelines often involved trenching or other methods for accessing the pipeline, which are time consuming and costly. As such, mechanical ‘no-dig’ point repairs have been the preferred method for repairing localized faults in pipelines.
However, existing no-dig point repairs are often not strong enough to ensure that the pipeline will not be broken again. For example, some existing point repair mechanisms are formed of metal only, and are not strong enough to ensure that tree roots or other obstructing growth will not re-damage the pipeline. Furthermore, many existing point repair mechanisms require lengthy curing times, making them labor and equipment intensive, and consequently also costly due to the need to bypass pump. Additionally, in existing systems the locking system of the point repair system is located within the conduit being repaired, thereby at least partially obstructing the conduit or leaving catch points for waste material to catch on and potentially block the pipe.
There is thus a need in the art for a point repair system including metal as well as resin, which is strong enough to repair the pipeline while making sure that the repair remains strong for the long term, and having a closure mechanism which does not obstruct the conduit being repaired.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,684,860 to Rafferty discloses a quick lock ring seal coupling for conduits, which seal may be locked against inadvertent disconnection.
At the time of this writing, http://rauschusa.com/products/quicklock to Rausch USA discloses a point repair system for inside repair of pipes, using only a stainless steel sleeve with rubber outer cover and no resin or fibreglass. The repair sleeve is expanded within the pipe being fixed, and is locked into position therein.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,142,230 to Smalley et al. discloses a wellbore tubular patch for patching a hole in a wellbore, the patch having an expandable bottom member and being formed of a metal having an outer wrapper of fiberglass.